literature

Pest Control (TF Request)

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    “Um… are you sure you want to do this, Darius?”

    Darius nodded, putting his arm around his younger sister. “It’s okay, Dahlia.” he said, nodding. “Remember, this is for the good of the colony.”

    “I know, but…” Dahlia shook her head, brushing her long brown hair out of her face. “I’m scared. What if something goes wrong?”

    “Nothing is going to go wrong, Dahlia,” replied Darius, running a hand through his own short brown hair. “Look at everyone else who’s gone through this. No problems, no complications… they’ve all been perfectly fine. And if there was a problem… well, there are ways of reversing the procedure. There’s nothing to worry about!”

    “Well… to be honest, it’s not so much the procedure I’m worried about. More the aftermath.” She shuddered. “The thought of being so small… having to fend for myself, all alone out there…”

    “You won’t be alone. You’ll have everyone else with you. Just calm down and breath, okay? You’re going to be fine.” He pulled a card out of his pocket and swiped it in the key card slot, the mechanical doors sliding open as he did. As he stepped onto the platform behind the doors, a hatch opened up in the floor and a large shuttle rose out of it, big enough to easily fit two people. Darius stepped inside, Dahlia following close behind him. As soon as they were in, Darius punched in their destination, and the shuttle took off, speeding across the electronic track it was following.

    As the shuttle pulled out of the city, Dahlia began looking around, seeing all of the massive field surrounding them. Those fields were practically all she had ever known… after all, she had spent her whole life around them. That was what happened when you grew up on Eleusis, the name given to the planet that she inhabited. Of course, she’d heard the stories… about how her family’s old planet, some place called Earth, was quickly becoming uninhabitable due to climate change and the declining of natural resources. Thus, a plan was made to repopulate… to spread out across the galaxy, create more places for humanity to live. Eleusis was just one of the planets that they had found… and it was where both Dahlia and her older brother Darius had spent their entire lives. Neither of them had ever seen Earth in person.

    Eleusis was primarily a planet used for agriculture, as evidenced by all of the fields surrounding the city they had just left. In fact, that city was the only one on the entire planet, as it served as the main place of living for all of its citizens. Other than the city, it was just fields, seemingly endless fields of crops to sustain both Eleusis and the other colonies. And they were wonders to behold, too… robotics being used to harvest and tend to the crops, greenhouses dotted around everywhere, irrigation sprinklers using water from earth… everything was even solar powered, evidenced by the solar panels lined up along the sides of the fields. But Darius and Dahlia weren’t there to marvel at the technology. They had work to do.

    Despite all of the successes the colony had had with this planet, there was still one major problem that needed solving: insects. Practically the moment the crops started growing, insect-like creatures native to Eleusis began swarming them, eating whatever they could of the crops. They seemed to be immune to all of the pesticides used against them, and while the robots used in tending to the crops were programed to kill any of them on sight, it still wasn’t really enough to make a difference. Since the insects didn’t seem to have any natural predators, they were simply free to roam the planet, causing as much havoc as they pleased… at that was the problem that Darius and Dahlia were hoping to help fix.

    The shuttle began to slow down, coming to a complete stop in front of a large building. “Okay, this is our stop,” said Darius, climbing out of the shuttle. Dahlia followed close behind, still feeling rather nervous. She stayed close to him as they through the sliding glass doors, into the lobby of the medical building. “Excuse me,” said Darius, addressing the man at the front desk. “We’re here for the pest control procedure.”

    “Are you? Okay, just a second…” The man began pushing pushing buttons on his tablet before looking up again. “Ah, I see! You two must be Darius and Dahlia, then! Let’s see… it looks like you have the day shift, Dahlia. Darius, you’ll be working the night shift. That sound good to you?”

    Darius nodded. “Sound’s good,” he said.

    “Excellent!” The man put his tablet down and stood up. “I’ll take you to the room, then. Follow me!”

    As the two of them followed the man to the room, Darius leaned over to Dahlia. “Are you sure you want to do the day shift by yourself, Dahlia?” he asked. “We could always do it together, you know.”

    “I know, I know…” Dahlia sighed. “And… to be honest, I’m not too sure about it myself. I just… I think it will be better if we’re separated. I mean, I can’t keep clinging to you forever… I might as well start letting go now, right?”

    “Well… I guess so…” said Darius. “I just… don’t want you to be too nervous. You were pretty scared when we were boarding the shuttle, remember?”

    “Yeah… and I still am. I… I just think that this is for the best, okay?” As Dahlia walked on, she began thinking about the reason she had decided to go the day shift alone. She had been extremely shy growing up, always clinging to her family whenever she tried to do seemingly anything. Granted, her options of things to do were a bit limited since she had grown up on Eleusis, but even within the small scope of activities that she could do, she had always felt to nervous to try anything by herself. When her brother suggested that they do the pest control procedure, she knew that this was her big opportunity to finally break out of her nerves. It didn’t mean she wasn’t scared… but she was still going to do it, regardless of how nervous she was.

    “And… here we are!” The man opened the door to the room at the end of the hallway. “Meet Dr. Celeus, the man who made this whole operation possible!”

    Standing in front of them was a tall man with pale skin, black curly hair, and a small pair of glasses on his face. “Ah, hello there!” he said, smiling. “You’re here for the pest control procedure, I take it?”

    “Yes, we are.” said Darius. He looked over at Dahlia, who nodded. “I’m doing the night shift, and she’s doing the day shift.”

    “Ah, I see. I trust you don’t need me to explain to you what this will entail, do you?” Both of them shook their heads. “Okay, good. Then let’s begin.”

    He turned to the drawer behind him and opened it up, pulling out four needles, two of which appeared to be filled with some kind of green serum. He picked up the two colorless needles and turned to the two siblings. “These first two are simple antibiotic shots,” he said. “In case you end up contracting something from this.” Dahlia and Darius held out their arms, and the doctor stuck the needles into both of them, injecting them both. “Now for the actual procedure.”

    He turned around and picked up the green needles, before turning back to the two of them. “Now… are you sure you want to do this?” he asked. “It may be a while before you can return.” Both of them nodded. “Okay… here we go, then.” Once again, he stuck the needles into their arms, injecting the serum into both of them. “Okay, changing rooms are off to your right. I recommend you take all of your clothes off as soon as you get in there.” He grinned. “Good luck out there. And thanks for choosing to participate in this, by the way. You’re doing our colony a great service.”

    Darius turned to Dahlia and grinned. “Good luck, Dahlia,” he said. “I know you can do this.” With that he turned and walked into one of the changing rooms. Dahlia followed, walking into one of the changing rooms next to his. She sighed, before hesitantly removing all of her clothes and throwing them onto the ground next to her. It would begin any minute now.

    The first thing she noticed was the itching. Subtle at first, it quickly grew to the point where she was almost forced to scratch. But when she looked down, she immediately saw the cause: black feathers, spreading all across her body and arms. They covered her until her skin was barely even noticeable, her breasts seeming to disappear under the blanket of blackness. She looked down at her arms, watching them shrink and crack as the feathers covered them. It didn’t hurt, but it did look incredibly strange, seeing her own body like this. But she knew that she couldn’t let herself be afraid now. It was too late for that.

    As her arms contorted, she could see the feathers on her hands grow longer and longer, signifying the beginning of her wings. She felt the bones in her hand stretch and hollow out, the feathers coating them and covering them. She lifted one of her wings up, marveling at how light yet powerful it felt. This was what would allow her to fly… but not quite yet. She still had more changes to go through first.

    Right on cue, she felt something poke right through her backside, sticking out from her bottom. She turned her slightly more flexible neck to look behind her, seeing her long, thin tail feathers growing in. As she did, she suddenly began wobbling, her legs feeling a bit more unstable as they thinned and changed their stance. Once she got used to this new way of standing, she looked down at herself, seeing her now much thinner legs covered with grey scales. As she watched, her feet also began changing, her toes merging and growing longer and longer. Sharp talons sprouted to replace her toenails, and an extra toe grow out from the back of each of her feet, complete with its own talon.

    Looking next to her, she suddenly noticed a large object sitting next to her. She jumped, startled by its presence… and immediately realized that it was her shirt. She had been shrinking this entire time, to the point that he shirt was much larger than she was! But she didn’t have time to reflect on that, because she could already feel the feathers spreading up to her head. She felt her lips harden and stretch out, longer and longer, as her nose fused into them, her nostrils reappearing at the top of her grey beak. Her hair fell out as the feathers replaced it, and her eyes suddenly began increasing in clarity, allowing her to see longer and further than she ever could before. Realizing that the changes were now finished, she quickly spread her wings and shot up into the air, eager to test her new body.

    As she flew up, she noticed a mirror in the corner of the changing room. She flew over to it, landing on a nearby chair, and began scoping out the changes to her body. Instead of a human, she appeared to be a small bird… a blackbird, to be precise. Although, something seemed a bit off… as she examined her head, she noticed that there appeared to be a green ring around the top of it. No doubt this was a side effect of the additional genetic engineering that had gone into her change. She was no ordinary blackbird… she was specifically designed to take out the insects that had been terrorizing the crops, to target and eat them until there was nothing left. She was purely a predator… a killing machine.

    The door to the changing room opened and Dr. Celeus walked in, grinning. “Ah, I see you’re finally done changing!” he said. “Excellent!” He looked behind him quickly “Your brother recently finished too,” he said. “He should be in shortly.”

    As he said it, another small creature immediately flew into the room. It was a bat… one with a green stripe running down its front, signaling it to be another insect killer. “Dahlia!” it cried, flying over to her and landing next to her. “How was it?”

    “Um… kind of weird, to be honest…” Thanks to even more genetic testing, all members of the pest control program were able to communicate with each other in their animal forms. They could also still understand humans, though humans wouldn’t be able to understand them. “How was it for you?”

    “Well... again, weird.” Darius looked down at his new body. “I mean, having all of this fur is weird enough… and good god, these wings. My fingers felt like they were being stretched apart! And with the webbing forming between them and everything… it was super crazy, let me tell you.” He lifted up one of his feet, showing it to her. “Watching my feet change was kind of weird too… seeing those claws form was definitely unnerving. But I think what’s throwing me off the most is these ears!” He raised one of his wings, pointing at his massive ears. “Every sound feels like it’s just being blasted at me… everything is just so loud now!”

    “Well, that’ll help you catch those insects better, won’t it?” said Dahlia. She turned towards the door. “Anyway, I should probably go. I’ve still got a few hours until nightfall, and as long as I look like this, I might as well be out doing some work, right?”

    Darius nodded. “That’s true.” he said. “Anyway, I’ll meet you here when you get back, okay? We can talk about it before I go out for my own shift.”

    “Sounds great!” said Dahlia. With that, she spread her wings and took off, flying right out of the building and out to the fields. As she flew, she noticed other birds flying around, presumably other former humans scouting for insects. She watched them fly around for a bit, before remembering that she had a job to do; she couldn’t just spend the entire day flying around doing nothing. She began scanning the crops, looking for the tiny creatures, when all of a sudden…

    There! She saw one! Crawling around on that plant, about to tear right into it… it needed to be stopped. Her new instincts took over, and she dove right for the little insect, scooping it up into her mouth. She swallowed it immediately, the taste filling her with a strong sense of euphoria. She needed more! Luckily, there was another one right below her. And another one. And another. And another… the more she ate, the more confident she became. And to think she had doubted this program! She felt amazing! Better than she had ever felt in her entire life, probably!

    A few hours later, the sun finally began to set. By this point, Dahlia had lost track of how many insects she had devoured… not that she cared. She felt great; she was helping the colony, getting one of the best meals of her life… she felt powerful. Alive. Free. She could hardly wait to tell Darius about how great her day had been. And while she was at it, she would have to remember to thank him for convincing her to go along with this. After all, this really had been one of the best experiences she had ever had.
This was a request for artguy on FA, who wanted a bird and bat TF in a sci-fi setting. I'm not great at writing sci-fi, so hopefully it turned out okay. Also, huge thanks to :iconblackdragontfart: for giving me the general concept for this story. Check him out, he does some amazing stuff!

As usual, I welcome constructive criticism, and until next time, I'm Robert Dayson, signing off!
© 2017 - 2024 RobertDayson
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Orig1nalSin's avatar
Another great story, crediting both you as the writer and blackdragonfart for the concept. Very enjoyable to read, willing transformations are always interesting.